“No one,” I said quickly—too quickly.
His eyes moved. Then landed on me. The flush across my neck. I tried not to flinch. Not to lookguilty.
Malachi didn’t respond. Not with words. Only the faintest tightening of his jaw.
He lingered in the doorway a moment longer than he should have, gaze unreadable. Then: “We leave within the hour. Lysara, Santiago, and Gabriel are already preparing. I’ve arranged for two mares. You’ll be riding with me.”
I nodded, throat too tight to object.
A pause.
“What?” I asked, narrowing my eyes.
A hint of amusement ghosted across his face. “Your hair is… full of life this morning.” I scowled and instinctively reached up, fingers catching in the snarl of half-dried curls. They felt tangled and determined to escape my head entirely. I braced myself as I approached the mirror, legs strong but heavy, as if every bone had been lined with lead, and crossed into the bathing chamber.
Gods.
I looked like a bedraggled wraith spat back out by the cliffs.
“I must’ve fallen asleep with it wet,” I muttered, more to myself than him.
The memories hit in fragments. Kaelith’s mouth at my wrist. The flush of warmth. His blood on my tongue. And then—gods—I had taken from him. The thought sent my stomach lurching.
“I drank from him,” I whispered, the words tasting like rust. “From his wrist.”
“Which wrist?” Malachi’s voice cut through the haze.
“I don’t know… I can’t remember.”
“Try,” he pressed. “It is important.”
I closed my eyes, forcing the memory to sharpen, to pull itself together through the fog. The weight of his hand. The silver edge of the blade. The blood welling hot across my tongue.
“The left one,” I breathed. “Sliced open with Eryndis’s blade of truth.”
Malachi’s gaze lingered on me, unreadable, gold catching in the half-light.
“Of all places,” he murmured, more to himself than to me. “The left wrist—closest to the heart. Once called the lover’s vein.”
“It will be all right, Aurelia,” he said quietly.
I turned to face him. “What, exactly, will be all right?”
“You’re going through a transition,” he said, stepping closer. His tone was calm, but not dismissive.
“A transition,” I repeated flatly. “You’ll have to be more specific.”
His gaze held mine, gold catching in the half-light.
“If it completes, you will not wither,” he said. “Not the way King Talon did.”
I frowned. “But he’s a Vampyre.”
“Yes,” Malachi said. “And that is precisely the problem.”
He exhaled slowly. “Talon bound himself to the goddesses during the purge. He traded part of what we are—what endures—for the right to rule Nyxarra. Power for permission.”
His jaw tightened. “Vampyric immortality is not meant to be shared with gods. It doesn’t rot on its own. It doesn’t erode. But when it’s divided, when it’s bartered…”